Preparing for Agile201 Click / tap to move through the presentation. For rights & permissions, see final slide.

Why does preparation matter? Welcome to Agile201 This presentation explains how to migrate your team to Agile201. Why does preparation matter? How much preparation do you need? Here are some of the questions it can help you to answer: How does change actually work? How do you adapt Agile201 to your unique conditions & needs?

Why does preparation matter? Moving your team to Agile201 is like making any other change. Your team will master Agile201 more quickly. They’ll use the resources Agile201 offers consistently. Preparation is essential if the change is to be painless, effective & sustained. With preparation… They’ll work better as a team. And that will accelerate their overall performance.

How much preparation do you need? That depends… Review Agile201 to identify differences from your current ways of working. What processes, roles & tools will these differences impact? Agile201 is based on a standard but exceptionally complete model of Agile. So… Scale & adapt your implementation plan to reflect these differences.

The Chasm is the point where change starts to go bad. But why do we put so much emphasis on preparation? Well… Change management experts often speak of The Chasm. The Chasm is the point where change starts to go bad. After The Chasm – not so fine. Increasingly, they’re cool. Indifferent. Maybe even actively hostile to change. Teams are complicated. Some people are true innovators. Some are happy to adopt novelties. They’re keen. They already know what Agile201 can do for them. They’re willing to go the extra mile. They aren’t put off by early difficulties. They don’t demand much support. So the rest will be just as easy – won’t they? Barely aware of Agile201 (and maybe Agile itelf) & not eager to learn. They’ll need active persuasion & direct support if they’re going to adopt Agile201 fully. And they’re probably the majority of your organisation. So how are you going to bring get across? The Chasm © Agile201 Ltd – 2016 Implementing Agile201

How does preparation work? Adopting Agile201 is like any other change process: you need to identify & address the many dimensions of change. We recommend a process that looks more or less like this. Create the context for successful change. Integrate Agile201 with your other management systems. Walk through Agile201 together. Define your strategy Integrate with management Apply Agile201 Start using Agile201 in the real world. Walk team through Agile201 Test drive Agile201 Understand Agile201 Align with business Schedule on-going releases Plan to embed Agile201 even more fully. Walkthrough a sample of real work. Familiarise yourself with Agile201 – what it is & how it works. Make sure your customers are happy with Agile201. These steps are explained below.

These decisions will create the context for your success. Define your strategy Agile201 is an investment, & should be treated as such. So you need to decide how it will be managed for maximum impact & sustainability. Ownership. Who will be the final authority on Agile201 within your organisation? Who will be accountable for its success? Strategy. What is your purpose in adopting Agile201? What are your specific goals & targets? Where are the external touchpoints & interfaces? Business, PMO, operations, support, HR, etc.? How will you implement Agile201? What do the roadmap & timeline look like? What will each phase/release deliver? Support. Access. Check team access to Agile201.com. Including downloads (e.g., for training packs). Including business & Extended Team, as required. Where are your subject-matter experts, training, coaching, etc? What facilities, environments, tools, services, etc., do you need? Management cycles. How will you measure, evaluate & report? Issues, dependencies & risks. These decisions will create the context for your success.

So we suggest that you log into Agile201.com and…… Understand Agile201 The first key to successfully implementing Agile201 is understanding Agile201 itself. And not just the delivery teams… Step Benefit How Review Agile201 for Users. Understand the processes & resources Agile201 offers. Log into Agile201.com and, on the Welcome page, click on… Agile201 for Users. Walk through the Agile201.com menus. Familiarise yourself with Agile201’s overall structure. From any page, review each menu & sub-menu. Review key pages: Understand: From any page, click on… The Agile201 model of Agile. Agile201’s 3-layer model of Agile. Agile > Agile lifecycle. Core development cycle. Iteration > Overview. Agile organisation. The Core Team. People > Team organisation > The Core Team. Working with users. People > User. Building your Extended Team. People > Team organisation > The Extended Team. People > Team organisation > Building the Extended Team. The Agile201 tools & techniques. Understand the technical capabilities Agile201 offers. Tools for an overview of tools & techniques in the Agile lifecycle. Tools > [individual tool/technique] If you are leading the transition to Agile201, you need to be familiar with Agile201 too. So we suggest that you log into Agile201.com and……

Walk your team through Agile201 Familiarising your team with Agile201 is best done by making it a team activity in its own right. Arrange a team presentation. Log into Agile201.com and, on the Welcome page, click on Agile201 for Users. Make sure that the session is as interactive as possible. This will ensure that you all: Share the same core knowledge. Have an early opportunity to discuss options & interpretations. Understand each role & individual’s perspective & concerns. Identify Agile201’s impact on your existing ways of working. Identify links to non-Agile201 elements. E.g., mandatory controls, links to external functions, dependencies, etc. But minimise changes to areas covered by Agile201 itself. Use the opportunity to explain the preparation process as a whole. Try to make this just the start of a wider professional development process based on Agile201.

Align with the business If you’re already using Agile, your business partners should experience little change as a result of your adopting Agile201. But ‘little’ isn’t always the same as ‘none’. So… Will they see any changes to the Product Owner role after your adopt Agile201? Will their relationship & interaction with the Core Team change? Including setting or changing requirements. And daily access. Do they expect formal reports & controls Agile201 does not include? If any of these is true… Do you need to extend Agile201? Or would it be better to change how your business stakeholders are involved in your Agile delivery process?

Coordinate with management Every Agile delivery happens in a wider organisational context. Creating & maintaining the necessary relationships is key to success. Every organisation is unique, but here are some basic relationships you may want to consider. Finance, budgets & resourcing Coordination, tracking & controls Roles & responsibilities Standards & procedures PMO Audit/ Compliance Defining compliance Evidencing status & progress Corrective & preventive action Pipeline Programme Portfolio Operational acceptance Deployment Automation Warranty Operations Defining products Mapping releases Requirements vs stories Embedding users Key issues: Getting management stakeholders fully on board. Integrating with the Agile201. Products, roles, reporting, procedures, etc. Minimising controls, maximising collaboration. Facilities Tools Environments Services Support

Coordinate with management Take the output from your team walkthrough of Agile201. At each step, identify where Agile201 links to the rest of your organisation. Business, technical, PMO, management, operations, support… Decide which links need adaptation. If you replace any Agile201 tools, check that your new tools fit Agile201 cycles. Identify how these links actually work. People, process, tools, responsibilities, checks, materials, data, approvals, records, reports, etc. Define the tasks needed to create each adaptation. Update templates for boards, logs, etc. Adapt existing systems & tasks. Check for synergies & redundancies. Identify who will actually perform each task. Ideally all building & adaptation should be done by the team themselves. Schedule & implement adaptations. Train your team in the changes. Agile201 does not exist in isolation, and there will be places where Agile201 needs to be modified to address your organisation’s detailed needs. So… And expect to be re-optimising your approach again and again – that’s Agile!

Test drive Agile201 Walk your teams through a realistic sample of work, to check exactly how Agile201 will work for you. Walk through the delivery main cycle. Ideally using a recent example of successfully completed work. Try to be realistic. Simulate changes, risks & dependencies. Again, compare & contrast with your previous ways of working: What were the key differences? What should you to do about it? Try out the tools. Check out that everything fits. How did you use each tool? Did they work well? If you used any non-Agile201 tools, how did they fit into Agile201? Do you need to update them? Role-play key responsibilities. Check the hand-offs. Check the interfaces. With the business. With your Extended Team. With other external groups. Tune. Focus on breaks, pauses & ambiguities. Fix them before you start to use Agile201 for real. Confirm the team’s explicit commitment to Agile201.

This is where it all starts to come together. Apply Agile201 Now that you have set up Agile201 to work as you want, start using it in your day-to-day delivery work. This is where it all starts to come together.

Schedule on-going releases Like Agile itself, Agile201 is too large & rich to be mastered in a single induction process. To get the most out of Agile201, you may need a regular development programme. A basic release programme might look like this: Start with the Core Team’s internal activity: Iteration 0, Iteration Planning, Daily Stand-Up Meetings, Backlog management, Retrospectives, etc. Once that it working well, start working with your Extended Team. Support, dependencies, joint planning, etc. Finally, refine your methods of collaborating with the business. Starting with changes to the Product Owner’s role… Release Planning, Backlog Refinement, change control, etc. … then engaging the business more directly. Showcases, stories, user engagement, etc. The key to success is to implement Agile in an Agile way – iteratively, incrementally, with a focus on quality & adaptability.

What should you expect from Agile201? Broadly speaking, this is the shape of change you should probably expect… So what is happening at each point on the change curve? Adoption 1 month 3-6 months Adopting Agile201 is likely to follow much the same cycle as any change. Continuous growth & improvement Expertise Briefing Training Practicing Teething troubles More communications Coaching & support Internalisation Team effectiveness Current performance Familiarisation Uncertainty Resistance In other words, you invest a little effort & attention up front… … to make sustained gains later.

Getting help with Agile201 There is a whole range of FAQs. About Agile. About how to use Agile201.com. About subscriptions. Our T&Cs. & much else. You can raise issues through the Agile201 Community & Forums. Share experience & problems with the Agile201 community. And can set up forums for just your team or your organisation. Don’t forget to follow the Agile201 blog. Where we talk about any number of key issues with Agile and Agile201 alike. Or contact us directly. Through the feedback page. We’re keen to ensure that Agile201 provides the best possible solution & experience for our members. Or just email us at support@Agile201.com. Don’t forget, Agile201 tries to make it as easy as possible to adopt Agile201. We’d be especially interested in hearing your experiences of implementing Agile201.

Rights & permissions: You may distribute, use & edit this presentation as you see fit, except that you may not remove the Agile201 logos, copyright statements & other Agile201 identifiers.